The analysis in this book disputes entrenched interpretations of the comparative political economy of industrialized democracies. It questions, in particular, the widely-held assumption that social ...
More

The analysis in this book disputes entrenched interpretations of the comparative political economy of industrialized democracies. It questions, in particular, the widely-held assumption that social democratic governments will defend the interests of labour. The evidence shows that labour has become split into two clearly differentiated constituencies: those with secure employment (insiders) and those without (outsiders). The book focuses on three policy areas: employment protection (representing the main concern of insiders), and active and passive labour market policies (the main concern of outsiders). The main thrust of the argument is that the goals of social democratic parties are often best served by pursuing policies that benefit only insiders. The implication of the book's insider-outsider model is that social democratic government is associated with higher levels of employment protection legislation but not with labour market policy. The book also argues that there are factors that can reduce insider-outsider differences and weaken their influence on social democratic governments. These hypotheses are explored through the triangulation of different methodologies. The book provides an analysis of surveys and macrodata and a detailed comparison of three case-studies: Spain, the UK, and the Netherlands.Less

David Rueda

Published in print: 2007-10-01

The analysis in this book disputes entrenched interpretations of the comparative political economy of industrialized democracies. It questions, in particular, the widely-held assumption that social democratic governments will defend the interests of labour. The evidence shows that labour has become split into two clearly differentiated constituencies: those with secure employment (insiders) and those without (outsiders). The book focuses on three policy areas: employment protection (representing the main concern of insiders), and active and passive labour market policies (the main concern of outsiders). The main thrust of the argument is that the goals of social democratic parties are often best served by pursuing policies that benefit only insiders. The implication of the book's insider-outsider model is that social democratic government is associated with higher levels of employment protection legislation but not with labour market policy. The book also argues that there are factors that can reduce insider-outsider differences and weaken their influence on social democratic governments. These hypotheses are explored through the triangulation of different methodologies. The book provides an analysis of surveys and macrodata and a detailed comparison of three case-studies: Spain, the UK, and the Netherlands.

During this period the President of the European Commission lost his pivotal institutional position as power shifted from the followers of Monnet to the defenders of member state sovereignty. ...
More

During this period the President of the European Commission lost his pivotal institutional position as power shifted from the followers of Monnet to the defenders of member state sovereignty. National governments had democratic legitimacy which the initiating, goal-setting Commission lacked and de Gaulle enforced their veto over important innovations. A mixture of shared sovereignty in some matters and retained sovereignty in others meant that the Council of Ministers and later the European Council assumed greater prominence. Insider strategic innovation, using the Community Method personified by Delors as Commission President and the Single European Act, marked the triumph of binding agreements, but his successors were unable to sustain the past integration impetus.Less

Strategic Innovation by Insider Influence: Monnet to Delors

Jack Hayward

Published in print: 2008-05-29

During this period the President of the European Commission lost his pivotal institutional position as power shifted from the followers of Monnet to the defenders of member state sovereignty. National governments had democratic legitimacy which the initiating, goal-setting Commission lacked and de Gaulle enforced their veto over important innovations. A mixture of shared sovereignty in some matters and retained sovereignty in others meant that the Council of Ministers and later the European Council assumed greater prominence. Insider strategic innovation, using the Community Method personified by Delors as Commission President and the Single European Act, marked the triumph of binding agreements, but his successors were unable to sustain the past integration impetus.

This chapter analyses the transformations in party strategies that result from new voter demands and political-economic conditions. It presents a model that attempts to put together two important but ...
More

This chapter analyses the transformations in party strategies that result from new voter demands and political-economic conditions. It presents a model that attempts to put together two important but often unrelated literatures: one focusing on electoral competition and the other on comparative political economy institutions. It argues that comparing and identifying social democratic governments with low unemployment and conservative ones with low inflation is not productive. This identification is based on the assumption that labour is disproportionately affected by unemployment, which is inaccurate. It is shown that labour is divided into those with secure employment (insiders) and those without (outsiders) and that the electoral goals of social democratic parties are sometimes best served by pursuing policies that benefit insiders while ignoring the interests of outsiders.Less

Governments and Policy: The Insider–Outsider Partisanship Model

David Rueda

Published in print: 2007-10-01

This chapter analyses the transformations in party strategies that result from new voter demands and political-economic conditions. It presents a model that attempts to put together two important but often unrelated literatures: one focusing on electoral competition and the other on comparative political economy institutions. It argues that comparing and identifying social democratic governments with low unemployment and conservative ones with low inflation is not productive. This identification is based on the assumption that labour is disproportionately affected by unemployment, which is inaccurate. It is shown that labour is divided into those with secure employment (insiders) and those without (outsiders) and that the electoral goals of social democratic parties are sometimes best served by pursuing policies that benefit insiders while ignoring the interests of outsiders.

This chapter has two main goals: to produce data that provide a complete picture of the preferences of insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups; and to test whether these preferences fit into the ...
More

This chapter has two main goals: to produce data that provide a complete picture of the preferences of insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups; and to test whether these preferences fit into the partisanship model proposed in this book. The chapter proceeds as follows. The first section provides a brief explanation of the survey used in the analysis and the way insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups have been categorized. The second section offers a detailed explanation of the individual preferences implied in the insider-outsider model and an initial and descriptive assessment of their accuracy. The third section contains a systematic multilevel analysis of the individual preferences of insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups. The fourth section introduces the two macro factors which, in Chapter 2, were hypothesized to affect the differences between insiders and outsiders: job security and corporatism. The final section presents multilevel maximum likelihood models estimating the effects of job security and corporatism. The results corroborate the model's claims: lower levels of employment protection do indeed make insiders more like outsiders (i.e., more supportive of labour market policy). The results support an economic insider-outsider interpretation of the effects of corporatism on insider preferences.Less

The Preferences of Insiders and Outsiders: Testing the Model's Assumptions about Individual Interests

David Rueda

Published in print: 2007-10-01

This chapter has two main goals: to produce data that provide a complete picture of the preferences of insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups; and to test whether these preferences fit into the partisanship model proposed in this book. The chapter proceeds as follows. The first section provides a brief explanation of the survey used in the analysis and the way insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups have been categorized. The second section offers a detailed explanation of the individual preferences implied in the insider-outsider model and an initial and descriptive assessment of their accuracy. The third section contains a systematic multilevel analysis of the individual preferences of insiders, outsiders, and upscale groups. The fourth section introduces the two macro factors which, in Chapter 2, were hypothesized to affect the differences between insiders and outsiders: job security and corporatism. The final section presents multilevel maximum likelihood models estimating the effects of job security and corporatism. The results corroborate the model's claims: lower levels of employment protection do indeed make insiders more like outsiders (i.e., more supportive of labour market policy). The results support an economic insider-outsider interpretation of the effects of corporatism on insider preferences.

The previous chapters have shown that in the presence of insider-outsider conflict, social democratic governments will promote insider policies regardless of the consequences for outsiders. However, ...
More

The previous chapters have shown that in the presence of insider-outsider conflict, social democratic governments will promote insider policies regardless of the consequences for outsiders. However, it has also been argued that there are factors that make the interests of insiders more similar to those of outsiders, i.e., employment protection and corporatism. This chapter tests whether the relationship between government partisanship and policy is affected by these factors. It begins by analysing the dependent variables and their relationship to this book's hypotheses. It then introduces the explanatory variables. Finally, it briefly explores some methodological issues relevant to the statistical analysis, presents the results, and relates them to the model developed in previous chapters.Less

The Relationship between Partisan Government and Policy: An Analysis of OECD Data

David Rueda

Published in print: 2007-10-01

The previous chapters have shown that in the presence of insider-outsider conflict, social democratic governments will promote insider policies regardless of the consequences for outsiders. However, it has also been argued that there are factors that make the interests of insiders more similar to those of outsiders, i.e., employment protection and corporatism. This chapter tests whether the relationship between government partisanship and policy is affected by these factors. It begins by analysing the dependent variables and their relationship to this book's hypotheses. It then introduces the explanatory variables. Finally, it briefly explores some methodological issues relevant to the statistical analysis, presents the results, and relates them to the model developed in previous chapters.

This chapter presents a summary of the book's main findings and offers some final thoughts. It shows that insider-outsider politics have become an important part of any adequate account of social ...
More

This chapter presents a summary of the book's main findings and offers some final thoughts. It shows that insider-outsider politics have become an important part of any adequate account of social democracy since the 1970s. In the presence of insider-outsider conflicts, there exists a strong temptation for social democratic governments to promote less than egalitarian policies.Less

Insiders, Outsiders, Partisanship, and Policy: Concluding Remarks

David Rueda

Published in print: 2007-10-01

This chapter presents a summary of the book's main findings and offers some final thoughts. It shows that insider-outsider politics have become an important part of any adequate account of social democracy since the 1970s. In the presence of insider-outsider conflicts, there exists a strong temptation for social democratic governments to promote less than egalitarian policies.

The concluding chapter asks how our analysis has deepened, or reconfigured the concept of cosmopolitanism we began with. Cosmopolitanism in political thought is ongoing displacement by scholars who ...
More

The concluding chapter asks how our analysis has deepened, or reconfigured the concept of cosmopolitanism we began with. Cosmopolitanism in political thought is ongoing displacement by scholars who are located, at different times, in different relations of insidership and outsidership to different traditions. It is continuing destabilization; it is continuing confrontations with the hegemony of liberalism’s normative and structural hegemony. Cosmopolitanism becomes an ongoing set of practices by scholars themselves, a series of methodological interventions which, through the disciplined carrying-out of dislocative and relocative practices, leads to a shift in disciplinary self-understanding. Rather than the current status quo, in which challenges to liberalism’s hegemony are easily domesticated at the margins, we must seek a move towards a condition in which liberalism, along with other Westcentric presumptions and modes of thought, takes its place in a series of plural and co-eval engagements of thinkers and texts and ideas from all traditions with one another. It is from this possibility that we can begin to envision a political theory beyond Eurocentrism, after the presumptions of Eurocentrism’s primacy have been challenged and disestablished. Examples of such challenges are offered through the East Asian values debate, and the concept of veiling in Islam.Less

: Toward a Post-Eurocentric Paradigm in a Cosmopolitan Political Thought

Farah Godrej

Published in print: 2011-10-05

The concluding chapter asks how our analysis has deepened, or reconfigured the concept of cosmopolitanism we began with. Cosmopolitanism in political thought is ongoing displacement by scholars who are located, at different times, in different relations of insidership and outsidership to different traditions. It is continuing destabilization; it is continuing confrontations with the hegemony of liberalism’s normative and structural hegemony. Cosmopolitanism becomes an ongoing set of practices by scholars themselves, a series of methodological interventions which, through the disciplined carrying-out of dislocative and relocative practices, leads to a shift in disciplinary self-understanding. Rather than the current status quo, in which challenges to liberalism’s hegemony are easily domesticated at the margins, we must seek a move towards a condition in which liberalism, along with other Westcentric presumptions and modes of thought, takes its place in a series of plural and co-eval engagements of thinkers and texts and ideas from all traditions with one another. It is from this possibility that we can begin to envision a political theory beyond Eurocentrism, after the presumptions of Eurocentrism’s primacy have been challenged and disestablished. Examples of such challenges are offered through the East Asian values debate, and the concept of veiling in Islam.

This chapter introduces the age-based conception of newness as the starting-point for this study and specifies the study’ s empirical scope, e.g. its focus on organizationally new parties entering ...
More

This chapter introduces the age-based conception of newness as the starting-point for this study and specifies the study’ s empirical scope, e.g. its focus on organizationally new parties entering national parliament in advanced democracies with consolidated party systems. It further discusses the methodological challenges inherent in the cross-national study new party persistence and sustainability. The chapter concludes with a classification of party origins to systematically capture conditions of party formation. It distinguishes new formations founded with the support of already existing promoter organizations - ‘rooted new parties’ - from formations that are created by entrepreneurs without such ties - ‘entrepreneurial new parties’. It further distinguishes new formations created with the support of national politicians, ‘outsider formations’ and those that are created with such support, ‘insider formations’. This classification is applied to the 140 organizationally new parties that entered their national parliaments 1968-2011 in the 17 democracies covered.Less

Disentangling Dimensions and Sources of Party Success: Conceptual and Methodological Challenges

Nicole Bolleyer

Published in print: 2013-10-03

This chapter introduces the age-based conception of newness as the starting-point for this study and specifies the study’ s empirical scope, e.g. its focus on organizationally new parties entering national parliament in advanced democracies with consolidated party systems. It further discusses the methodological challenges inherent in the cross-national study new party persistence and sustainability. The chapter concludes with a classification of party origins to systematically capture conditions of party formation. It distinguishes new formations founded with the support of already existing promoter organizations - ‘rooted new parties’ - from formations that are created by entrepreneurs without such ties - ‘entrepreneurial new parties’. It further distinguishes new formations created with the support of national politicians, ‘outsider formations’ and those that are created with such support, ‘insider formations’. This classification is applied to the 140 organizationally new parties that entered their national parliaments 1968-2011 in the 17 democracies covered.

Most new liberal and new left parties form as entrepreneurial insiders and form the counter-image to the rooted outsider parties dominating the Green and religious group. Being formed by national ...
More

Most new liberal and new left parties form as entrepreneurial insiders and form the counter-image to the rooted outsider parties dominating the Green and religious group. Being formed by national politicians, their elites are strongly office-oriented, which shows in a high rate of insider parties that enter national government. By forming or joining a new party national politicians usually hope to improve their career prospects. While these parties enter government more quickly than parties in other families, they remain vulnerable as organizations in the longer term. Being run by career politicians, these parties institutionalize in terms of routinization assuring intra-organizational coordination and conflict resolution especially within the parliamentary party but do not invest in structures generating organizational loyalty. While some of these parties have persisted for several decades and have been highly successful, their activities were tied to individual political careers, which ceased once the generation of founders left.Less

The Leadership–Structure Dilemma in Liberal and Leftist New Parties: Short-Term Success but Long-Term Decline through Partial Institutionalization

Nicole Bolleyer

Published in print: 2013-10-03

Most new liberal and new left parties form as entrepreneurial insiders and form the counter-image to the rooted outsider parties dominating the Green and religious group. Being formed by national politicians, their elites are strongly office-oriented, which shows in a high rate of insider parties that enter national government. By forming or joining a new party national politicians usually hope to improve their career prospects. While these parties enter government more quickly than parties in other families, they remain vulnerable as organizations in the longer term. Being run by career politicians, these parties institutionalize in terms of routinization assuring intra-organizational coordination and conflict resolution especially within the parliamentary party but do not invest in structures generating organizational loyalty. While some of these parties have persisted for several decades and have been highly successful, their activities were tied to individual political careers, which ceased once the generation of founders left.

Chapter 5 explores political experience and connections. It assesses whether women and men are equally likely to bring the political capital resource of political skills to the administration. In ...
More

Chapter 5 explores political experience and connections. It assesses whether women and men are equally likely to bring the political capital resource of political skills to the administration. In most cases, men and women seem equally likely to have (or to lack) political background traits. However, in the overall data set and among initial ministers women are less likely to be political insiders (have political skills). But, in many partitions of the dataset women are more likely to have political connections, although a majority of men and women do not have connections so this is not a requirement. This chapter also investigates whether ministers who have political connections also have policy expertise related to the purview of their portfolio. Statistically equivalent percentages of men and women with political connections have experience related to their post suggesting connections are not a wholesale substitute for qualifications.Less

Political skills : When and where presidents appoint ministers with political background and connections

Maria C. Escobar-LemmonMichelle M. Taylor-Robinson

Published in print: 2016-09-29

Chapter 5 explores political experience and connections. It assesses whether women and men are equally likely to bring the political capital resource of political skills to the administration. In most cases, men and women seem equally likely to have (or to lack) political background traits. However, in the overall data set and among initial ministers women are less likely to be political insiders (have political skills). But, in many partitions of the dataset women are more likely to have political connections, although a majority of men and women do not have connections so this is not a requirement. This chapter also investigates whether ministers who have political connections also have policy expertise related to the purview of their portfolio. Statistically equivalent percentages of men and women with political connections have experience related to their post suggesting connections are not a wholesale substitute for qualifications.